


The Good Witch

by violettavioletta



Series: The Good Witch [1]
Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling, Supernatural
Genre: F/M, I wrote this when I was fourteen lol
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-16
Updated: 2021-02-16
Packaged: 2021-03-18 14:21:25
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,950
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29491245
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/violettavioletta/pseuds/violettavioletta
Summary: Dean is undercover as a high school chemistry teacher. He is supposed to be focusing on his case, but honestly, he's a bit distracted by the other chemistry teacher, Mrs. Weasley. Rating for language (Dean Winchester is involved, after all).
Relationships: Hermione Granger/Dean Winchester
Series: The Good Witch [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2168964
Comments: 1
Kudos: 10





	The Good Witch

Dean hated high schools.

He had never cared for them when he himself was a student, and now that he found himself back in one, he couldn't say that he liked them any better. He'd come to the school to investigate a strange death. A student had died alone in a classroom behind a locked door, seemingly in absolutely perfect health save for the fact that she was dead. Three weeks after he'd somehow managed to get himself a position as a substitute chemistry teacher (something he thought was absolutely fucking hilarious, up until recently he'd thought that a "periodic table" was a type of furniture), he'd made no progress on the case and even less progress on the small school's only other chemistry teacher, Mrs. Weasley.

She was a widow. The day they'd met, he'd casually mentioned her wedding ring, asking about her husband. It had been the wrong thing to say. She'd mumbled, "my husband is dead, Mr. Winchester" in that quiet yet forceful and undeniably _British_ way of hers and turned away. Since then, she'd said hardly two words to him, despite his efforts. She was an absolutely beautiful woman, barely five feet but smart as a whip, and if he was going to be trapped in a high school, he at least wanted to have some fun. But she seemed to spend most of her time when she wasn't teaching in the school's chemistry lab, the one place he couldn't follow her. He wasn't about to walk into a place that could so easily reveal his total lack of knowledge on chemistry. So he read from the slides the previous teacher had left him and spent his free time trying to dig up clues. It wasn't the most exciting life, and he was starting to get antsy.

"Mr. Winchester?" a voice called, pulling him out of his thoughts. He was shocked- the voice had a British accent! Mrs. Weasley never sought him out, avoiding him like the plague.

 _Knew I'd get her in the end_ , he thought proudly. He was, after all, something of a sex God. They could never stay away for long.

"Yes, Mrs. Weasley?" he responded, swiveling his chair in the small chemistry office around to face her.

"I'm terribly sorry to bother", she said, her voice timid. _Don't be, Sweetheart_ , he thought. "But I'm working on some experiments in the lab, and they're time-sensitive. Only I've just gotten a call from my sister-in-law, they need me right now, it's an emergency- one of their children is very sick. I'd hate to let the experiment die, it's really very important, and it took me quite a while to set up..."

At that, all thought of how strange it was that her sister-in-law lived close enough for her to get there so quickly- had all her family moved to the states?- flew from his mind, and the grin slipped from Dean's features. "What do you need me to do?" he asked, masking his nerves with bravado.

"Oh, don't worry", she said, "it's really very simple. Follow me." Left with no other choice, he did, and she led him into the chemistry lab. It was rather a lot bigger than he'd imagined it from the outside, maybe he should've looked around here rather than avoiding it. She led him to a beaker with a thermometer in it.

"Just record the temperature every eight minutes and thirty-two seconds. Record it as precisely as possible. Even someone with _absolutely no chemistry background_ could do it", she said. He froze. "And you've got a masters, right, Mr. Winchester?"

He smiled easily, carefully. "Yep. From MIT, too." That must just be how Brits talked. She couldn't know, right? She couldn't know. He'd been so careful. You could call anyone who may have reason to know, and they'd tell you Dean Winchester had graduated from MIT with honors, class of '00. He was being paranoid.

"Well, I'll be seeing you, then", he said, and she nodded.

"Record the temps on that spreadsheet", she said, pointing to a laptop. With that, she turned on her heel and returned to the chemistry office. Though no one saw her, she pulled a bag of powder from her pocket as she did, throwing it into the fireplace that led to nowhere had always seemed out of place in the chemistry office. As she did, a green blaze flared up, and in a second Wichita's secret witch was gone.

* * *

He'd lasted two rounds before he fucked it up.

"Shit", he mumbled as he'd heard the last bell of the day pull him from a sleep. He'd missed God only knows how many eight minute and thirty-two second cycles, and the previously lavender liquid in the beaker had turned a deep red. Fuck, fuck fuck. Swearing randomly to himself, he stood up, putting his hands in his hair. He considered making up temperatures for Mrs. Weasley, it wouldn't be the worst thing he'd done, but somehow, he couldn't bring himself to do it. Forget the fact that he figured her research was probably important- another teacher had told him she was a PhD student, specializing in medical application of chemistry- something about lying to her didn't sit right with him. And even if he did, he had the most sinking feeling that she'd know, somehow.

Ah, well. He didn't have her cell phone number, so at this point, the only thing to be done was to turn off the heat under the beaker and wait for her to return. He was about to turn and walk out of the chemistry lab when, sighing deeply in an attempt to calm himself down, he smelled it.

Asphodel.

Normally, the smell wouldn't be cause for alarm. Asphodel was merely a type of lily, plenty of people kept it in their homes. But he knew Mrs. Weasley wouldn't be keeping it in her lab, there was nothing at all in the lab besides her experiments- it was a very poor idea indeed to keep outside materials in a sterile lab, even he knew that. And asphodel... he'd seen it used before.

By witches.

He followed the faint smell. It seemed to get stronger as he moved to the back of the lab. When he reached it, he tapped the back wall- could there be some sort of hidden room? He was rewarded by a hollow sound- definitely something back there, then. But how to reach it? There was no door, nothing to indicate anything behind the drywall.

"Damn those Brits", he muttered, "Damn that Weasley and her goddamn lily..."

As soon as the word _lily_ left his lips, he jumped back, startled. The wall began to _change._ Within a few seconds, he was staring at a door.

 _Why is it always the hot ones that are witches?_ he muttered to himself. Because she was. A witch, that was. There was no denying it, even before he stepped into the little room, that display of magic proved it. What he found inside the room was just the icing on the cake.

She was brewing potions, a lot of them.

He had to hand it to her, it was clever. Get a teaching job at some middle of nowhere high school, knowing she'd get the run of the lab, and then use it to brew her potions. Hell, she was probably even putting the non-demonic brewing supplies on her tax write offs, citing work expenses. He had to hand it to her, indeed. He moved to touch a ladle near one of the cauldrons, trying to work out what the brew inside of it was, when he heard a familiar British voice. His blood ran cold.

"I wouldn't touch that if I were you", she said simply, holding a long wooden stick to his face, "It's liable to explode. _Stupefy."_

There was a flash of light. And then everything went dark.

* * *

He woke up tied to a chair in some dark room. It looked like a basement. Mrs. Weasley- if that was even her name- stood in the corner, her stick thing trained on him.

"Bit harsh for ruining your experiment, isn't this?" he asked, that classic humor of his floating to the surface. She didn't smile. He dropped the pretense.

" _Witch_ ", he spat, pulling at the bonds. Her eyes widened very slightly, almost imperceptibly.

"Do believe we'd worked that one out, _Death Eater_ ", she spat, just as much viciousness in her voice. Now he was genuinely confused. Was that what witches called hunters? Why had he never heard the term before? Maybe it was a British thing.

"The fuck does that mean?" he asked, figuring that if she was going to kill him, he may as well get his questions in first.

"Don't play stupid", she hissed. Turning in her heel, she grabbed a vial of some sort of clear liquid off a shelf behind her. "Time for a drink."

He almost laughed. "If you think I'm just going to-"

" _Petrificus Totalus"_ , she muttered, interrupting him. Suddenly, he found himself completely frozen. She poured the liquid down his throat. Before he could choke on it, she muttered something else, and he swallowed it against his will. He was a bit shocked, he'd never seen a witch do something like that. Yet again, he'd never seen a witch that actually used a magic wand, either. Must be another British thing.

"What is your name?" she asked. He was going to tell her to shove it, but found himself answering without his brain's permission.

Truth potion.

"Dean Winchester."

"Hmm. You didn't lie then. Tell me, Dean Winchester, where is your wand?"

 _What?_ "I don't have a... wand?"

She growled. "I don't know how the fuck you're resisting the veritaserum, but it won't fool me, Death Eater. _Where is your wand?"_

"I don't have one!"

" _Cruc_ -" she started to yell something, he assumed it was a curse, when she stopped. Her face seemed white. "I... I'm... I can't..." She stared for another moment, then turned and walked out of the room.

He didn't see her again before he drifted off into oblivion.

* * *

When he woke up, he wasn't on the floor anymore. He was still restrained, but he appeared to be in some sort of armchair this time. Looking around, he didn't even think he was in the basement anymore. It was definitely some sort of living room.

"I called us both in sick and got a sub to cover our classes", Mrs. Weasley said by way of greeting, walking into the room. She still held her wand in front of her. Clearly, the armchair didn't mean she was going to be any nicer. "No reason for our students to suffer just because you're a Death Eater." She produced another vial of the clear liquid. "Drink up like a good boy, and I won't even put a body bind on you this time."

He scowled, but decided it wasn't worth it to fight her. Clearly, he was going to drink the stuff whether he wanted to or not. With murder in his eyes, he opened his mouth, and she tipped the stuff into his mouth. He felt the strange, floating feeling overtake him once again.

"Where is your wand?"

God, this shit again. "I _told_ you, Sweetheart. Get it through your thick, British skull. _I don't have a Goddamn wand._ "

She was shocked. She'd brewed this veritaserum herself, making adjustments based on Snape's notes on the topics that should've made it impossible to resist. But... but that meant... surely he wasn't...

"You were telling the truth, then?" She asked, trying to sound confident. She failed, her ask coming out as more of a question. He nodded.

 _"_ Then... you aren't a Death Eater, then?"

"No, Sweetheart", he practically growled, "I'm not a Death Eater, whatever the fuck that is. I'm not here to hurt anyone. I'm one of the fucking good guys."

For a moment, she seemed stunned. Then she put her head in her hands.

"I should obliviate you", she said after a moment. "I wouldn't even need a middle man, I'm ministry certified... but I... I just... look", she said, waving her wand. His ropes fell away. "We can go back to before. You make futile attempts to talk to me, I ignore you, you do whatever it is you're here for, with your fake degrees. Yes, I know about the fake degrees. It's probably illegal, what you're doing, but as long as you're not hurting anyone, I really don't care. You do your job, I do mine, and neither of us ever mentions that ever again. Deal?"

Dean smiled. "Deal."

She reached out her hand to help him up. Idiot.

Before she could blink, he had her pinned against the wall, her wand in his hand. He threw it against the wall. He turned back to her, ready to interrogate her. But what he saw made her freeze.

He'd expected her to fight back, to struggle, to snarl, to claw at him. Instead, she had gone completely still, and nearly limp. He realized she was shaking.

"Let me go", she said, her voice trembling. He didn't move. He wasn't a fool. "You have to let me go now!" He only pinned her tighter. But before he could even ask her anything, she'd passed out.

Ah, well. At least this made it easier. Swearing as he did, he scooped her up and put her on the armchair he'd just vacated, tying her up with her own ropes. Then he sat, waiting for her to wake up.

* * *

She took more than a day to wake up.

The tables had certainly turned, he thought. This time, it was him calling the school, setting up substitute teachers, sitting around, eating her food- he scoffed a little at it, it seemed all this bitch ate was tea and salad- and sitting around, waiting for her. He wondered to no end why the fuck she'd passed out like that, he hadn't even touched her. Some witch defense mechanism? Is that was what it was, it wasn't a very good one.

"You are _so_ lucky my nephew is so sick", a voice growled, pulling him out of his thoughts. "And that I had the time to send the potions his parents needed before I brought you here, and that I figured it was best not to mention you, just in case I was wrong about you. Which I was. But not that wrong. Anyway, otherwise, my in-laws would have killed you."

"Do you ever shut up?" he responded, even if he was a bit fascinated by what was going on. He needed to think.

"No", she said, her voice still gravelly. She tried to move and found herself tied down. As soon as she did, she went white again.

"You need to untie me", she said, no small amount of pleading in her voice, though there was something else there, clinical detachment. Like a doctor. "You need to untie me!"

"Why?" he asked, his curiosity getting the better of him.

"I'm... I have... a condition... if I... get scared... if I'm restrained... I... I'm going to pass out again for God knows how long..."

"I... do you promise you won't go anywhere?" he asked. It was lame, yes, but what else was he supposed to do? He needed to question her. Maybe he'd have to kill her afterwards, but he needed to know what was up first. If he let her pass out again, she'd die. He didn't have an IV, and she was a small thing. Another day without liquid was likely to kill her.

" _YES!"_ she practically growled, "Now... un...tie... please..."

He realized she was losing consciousness again. Making a split-second decision, he quickly untied her, but stayed close over her, keeping her from escaping.

"Back away", she ground out. He stayed put. "For Merlin's sake, back the bloody fuck away!"

He obeyed her British-ass command. She took a few deep breaths, as if having some sort of panic attack. After a few gasps, she got herself under control.

"Alright", she ground out, "Go on then, ask your questions. You've taken my wand and you're a hell of a lot bigger than me, you know I won't try to escape. But no ropes. And no knives. And don't point my wand at me, if you've got it, even if you can't actually use it. Nothing... threatening."

He paused a moment, wanting to laugh. "Look here, Sweetheart-"

"No, you look here, _love_ ", she interrupted, spitting the term of endearment, "There are some after effects to brutal torture at seventeen years of age and then again a few years later. This is one of them. If you keep scaring me into unconsciousness, eventually I'm not going to wake up, and then you'll be in fucking trouble. My nephew won't stay sick forever, and then they'll be looking for me. So go on, ask your questions. I give you my word that I will answer them truthfully. But if you keep being so goddamn threatening, I'm just going to pass out again!"

He paused, reeling. "Fine. But I want proof you'll answer truthfully. Where's that... that clear truth stuff..."

"You can't be serious!" she exclaimed. He raised an eyebrow. "I am _not_ giving you my veritaserum. Never mind that I used the last of my stock interrogating you and it takes weeks to brew and is bloody goddamn expensive to buy from someone else, you have no fucking idea how to use it. I don't even know if it would work for you, I'd have to do research. A lot of potions with a class four stagnant base like veritaserum won't even _work_ when they're administered by a Muggle-"

"Alright, _alright",_ he cut her off, not knowing what the fuck any of that meant and not particularly caring, "Just... just shut up."

There was a moment of silence. Swearing, he walked over to a minibar in the corner of the room, filling a glass with water. He didn't take her eyes off her. He handed her the glass. She took it warily, but it seemed her burning thirst outweighed her apprehensiveness, and she began sucking it down greedily.

"When were you tortured?" he asked suddenly. She shuddered.

"The Second Wizarding War."

"The... what?"

She sighed. "This is going to take a lot of explaining. First, tell me about you. How do you know about witches?"

He sighed. He was at a stalemate. If he tied her up and forced her to talk, she'd probably die, and then he wouldn't get his answers. He still needed to know what had killed the girl, and he still thought it was probably Mrs. Weasley...

"What's your first name?" he asked, dodging her question. She seemed startled.

"Hermione", she finally said, "My name is Hermione. Hermione Jean Granger Weasley."

"Dean Jonathan Winchester", he responded, a ghost of a playboy smile on his face. "Guess you can curse me now."

"I could've cursed you without your full name, it's only the really old, really complicated spells that need your full name. They usually need your blood too, though, so... anyway."

His smile was gone now. "You have ten minutes to explain yourself, witch."

"First I need to know how you know about witches. And what you know about them. Please, it's important."

He sighed. "Yeah, fine. Whatever, princess. Family business. We hunt monsters. Supernatural shit. That includes witches. Bitches that sell their souls to the devil for a bit of magic. You're the first one I've met that uses a wand, though. Must be a British thing."

As he spoke, her eyes widened until they looked as if they'd pop out of her skull. Finally, she managed to get the word out. "Hunter."

He bristled. "Yeah, that's right. Witch."

"So... so they _do_ exist! Oh, if the Ministry knew about this..."

"The what?" he asked. Couldn't she ever speak bloody fucking sense?

"The Ministry. Of Magic. British magical government. There's a magical government here, too, of course, but I work for the British government. This is... going to take some explaining." He gestured with his hand, inviting her to get on with it.

"About fifteen years ago, I got a letter from a school called Hogwarts. I was eleven years old. This letter told me that I was a witch with magical powers. For the first time, everything made sense. When I was little, whenever I'd get upset, things would blow up. I couldn't use computers without them exploding. And my toys would move, all by themselves. Turns out, it was my magic. I was born with it, unlike the things you hunt that you call witches. They aren't. They're Muggles- means non magical people, I think they call them no-majs in America? Anyway, they aren't real witches, they're Muggles who have sold their souls. They're not nearly as powerful as real witches and wizards, though. They never will be. They taught me to control my natural magic at that school, taught all the witches and wizards in the UK. It was a boarding school, in an old castle in Scotland. And it was bloody beautiful.

"But then, war came. Before I'd ever been born, the First Wizarding War had happened, thanks to a very evil wizard who believed in something called blood purity, which is basically the belief that Muggles and Muggleborns, like me- witches and wizards with muggle parents- were inherently inferior and should be stomped out. When I was almost two, before I or my parents knew anything about magic or magical war, of course- the Muggles just thought there were a string of weird terrorist attacks, the Ministry covered everything up, but of course Muggles were dying too- that wizard tried to kill a baby based on a prophesy that said that baby would kill him one day. The baby's mother died for him, and because of that, the wizard couldn't kill him. It's vey ancient magic, a love sacrifice. In trying to kill the baby, he destroyed himself, but he had done some seriously fucked up shit that made it so he couldn't die for good. But he was gone for a while.

"Anyway, at school, that baby became my best friend. His name was Harry Potter. And his best friend... my other best friend, was called... called Ron. Ron... Weasley."

She said all of this with the air of someone who'd said it a hundred times, and the sudden stutter seemed rather out of place. Dean, who'd been listening with rapt attention and mistrust, suddenly started.

Her husband, had to be.

"Anyway, the evil wizard kept trying to return to power. We first faced him in our first year. Harry got it worst, of course. And we kept meeting him. He officially came back to power in our fifth year, though the Ministry refused to acknowledge it. Took a secret society and a battle of wands with some Death Eaters- that's what he called his supporters and that's why I nabbed you, I thought you were one of them- within Ministry halls for the Minister to finally admit it. And that's when the war started. Harry, Ron and I finished it. We went on a mission to destroy the things the evil wizard had made that made him impossible to kill and then, when everything was done, Harry killed him. The press went wild, that's when I first started thinking of going to America. And when... when some rogue Death Eaters... murdered my husband... Ron... when they killed him, I convinced the Ministry to let me track them down. They led me here. I didn't lie when I took the chemistry teacher job. At least, not much. If anything, I played myself down. I'm a Potions Mistress, the equivalent of a doctor of chemistry in the muggle world."

Dean wasn't sure what to say. "Wait, a doctor?" He finally settled on, "How old are you?"

She smiled lightly. "Twenty-five."

"Twenty-five." A war hero, a doctor and widow, at twenty-five. God damn. There was another silence. "How... why... tell me about your... medical condition. From the torture. Were you... did they really torture you?"

She paled slightly, but seemed to resolve herself. "You aren't shy, are you?" He shook his head. If the topic hadn't been so heavy, she might have laughed. "I was tortured at seventeen by a women called Bellatrix Lestrange. She's dead now, my mother-in-law killed her when she tried to kill her daughter. It was all quite badass, to be honest. But anyway, Harry, Ron and I were captured. Bellatrix thought we'd stolen something of hers. We hadn't, it was given to us, but I couldn't tell her that. She cut my throat and carved... carved mudblood into my arm. That's a slur, in the Wizarding world, for Muggleborns. Means dirty blood. Muggle blood. Anyway, when that didn't work, she... she used her favorite curse. The Cruciatus Curse.

"That's the one I almost used on you, earlier, but couldn't bring myself to. Figures. I've been hunting Ron's killers for years just to torture them with that curse, and when I tried to do it... anyway, I'm getting ahead of myself. The Cruciatus Curse targets nerves. It's dangerous to use it at all, but it's especially dangerous after ten seconds. Bellatrix... she kept it on me for over two minutes", she says very lightly, her voice barely audible.

Dean shudders.

"Anyway. I was blind and deaf and out of my mind for about a week afterwards. I'm mostly alright, now. But with one big side effect. Usually, when witches and wizards are threatened, their magic reacts to neutralize the threat, exploding outwards. If I was a normal witch, you wouldn't have been able to hold me down like that without being turned into a cockroach or something by my magic, since you're a

Muggle and have no natural magical shields. But I'm... different. The Cruciatus Curse damaged my magic to its core. I used to be an incredibly powerful witch. I still am, in bursts. But my magic is withdrawn. It is hiding within itself. So when I feel threatened, rather than exploding, it implodes. Knocks me out. And sometimes it does it just for kicks, if it gets restless, so I always have to be using it. Not difficult, with the amount of wards around this house. Oh, and I do magic lessons for a few local kids. They do magic school different here in the states. They have a boarding school like mine, but they also have more normal schools. I can't have kids of my own. The Cruciatus Curse made sure of that. Ron and I were... were devastated...

"Further exposure to any kind of torture could kill me by making my magic implode on me. But any more Cruciatus Curse would undeniably kill me. That's how... that's how Ron died."

The room was silent. Hermione seemed to be taking to herself at this point.

"It was three years ago. I still don't know how the Death Eaters found us. I warded the house myself, and Ron reinforced it. Two war heroes, highly trained wizards, a Potions Mistress and an Auror, that's a highly trained wizard cop. But somehow, a rogue group of Death Eaters found us. They blamed us for the fall of their master. Flattering, really. The plan was to torture me to death and make Ron watch, then kill him quick. He was a pureblood... all wizard relatives... they didn't have anything against him, really, except for the fact that he'd chosen the other side. But... when he realized what they were going to do...

"I don't know how he did it, but he got out of their grip and knocked the bastard casting the Cruciatus over before he could hold it for more than a few seconds. Told me to run. I didn't have my wand, they'd caught us unaware, neither of us had a wand on us. I managed to escape by running into the fireplace and using the Floo... that's a way wizards travel, it's why I put one in the chemistry office... I tried to bring the Aurors back but it was too late... they'd gotten away... and Ron... Ron..."

Hermione burst into tears, taking the same big, gasping breathes she'd been taking before. Dean acted on instinct. Witch or no witch, he couldn't let her hyperventilate.

He couldn't just watch her fall apart.

He sat down next to her. She didn't seem to notice. Tentatively, gently, he put his arms around her. She stiffened, and for a moment he was sure he'd made a mistake. But then she melted into him, turning her head into his chest, and he tightened his grip, tucking her head against his chin. For perhaps the first time in his life, Dean Winchester held a woman until she fell asleep, his only intention to make her feel better.

* * *

When she woke up, at first she thought she was back with Ron. And then she remembered the previous events, and she wanted to cry again.

He was still dead.

She wiggled out of Dean's grip, waking him up as she did.

"And just where are you going?" he asked, though there was no malice in it. She put a hand on her hip.

"Forgive me. Am I still your prisoner?"

He considered it, but before he even began he knew what his answer would be. Her story was insane, yes, but so was his. Besides, his kind of witch wasn't capable of crying, so he knew she couldn't be a demon. That really only left one option, and that was that she was telling the truth.

"Nah."

"Good", she said, and while her tone was confident he noticed that a bit of tension left her shoulders. "I was hoping to get into work today, I don't think it's good for the students to stay without me for too long. May I have my wand?"

He considered saying no, but could find no justifiable reason to. Slightly warily, he pulled it from his pocket. Her eyes laughed a bit at that.

"You shouldn't keep your wand in your pants pocket", she said, with an air that suggested the words were not hers, "There's witches and wizards that have lost buttocks that way."

She laughed a bit at his expression, then turned to the kitchen. "Will you be wanting breakfast?"

"Yeah", he said, standing up, "I'm starving. But none of that gross British shit you seem to be into. Haven't you got any pancakes?"

She sighed and waved her wand. In a second, the fixings for pancakes were flying around the kitchen. "Americans", she muttered scornfully, "They refuse to eat anything that won't give them a heart attack. Come on then, we'll sit in the dining room. The pancakes will follow when they're done."

For a moment, Dean could only stare at the scene in the kitchen. But then Hermione was tugging his arm, and he was pulled away.

"So", she said as soon as they'd sat down, "I assume you're here investigating Missy Bryers' death?"

Dean wasn't surprised. He'd been waiting. "Yeah. Artemis Bryers. When I found your little potions lair, I assumed it was you. Now, I'm... not so sure, to say the least."

Hermione sighed. "It was Death Eaters. The same ones who killed Ron. They used the Killing Curse, it doesn't leave a mark or anything. Missy... Artemis was... she was what we call a squib. Her parents and siblings were magical, but she wasn't. She knew who I was as soon as she met me, I'm somewhat famous in our world. She asked if I could tell her about magic. Her family avoided it around her, not wanting to depress her, but I agreed. We had... something of a friendship. I think... I think that's why they killed her."

"So... not my kind of witch, then."

"No", Hermione agreed. "Not your kind of witch at all."

"So... you'll take care of it, then?"

She nodded carefully. "If I can."

"So... not really a reason for me to stay."

She cocked her head. "I guess not."

"Probably for the best", he mumbled, "I know you already know this, but I'm shit at chemistry."

She feigned shock. "No, really?" They laughed. They stopped laughing. The mood was, again, somber. It had been somber since she'd brought him here, really.

"You know", she said, "I should obliviate you. That's protocol. You wipe the memories of Muggles who know about magic. That's how I knew what a hunter was, the Magical Congress of the USA put out warnings about them, but the Ministry of Magic never bought it, and I'd never met one. I didn't think they were real. We're supposed to obliviate them if we meet them, wipe all their memories, but... I don't know. I don't... I don't want to do that with you. Even if, in time, you'll start to doubt I was real, start to wonder if this whole three weeks was nothing but some sort of fever dream, for some inexplicable reason, I want you to remember me. You're... you're the only person I've ever really talked to about... about what the Cruciatus did to me. Harry and Ginny and the rest know, of course, but we don't talk about it. I guess... I don't know. Something about you knowing makes me feel... safe. Safer than I've felt since... since Ron, I guess. I'm... I'm sorry. I'll stop now. I've always... always been a chatterbox."

"I like it", he said simply. The pancakes arrived then, and they devolved into a comfortable silence.

"Well", he finally said, "I guess I should go. You've got to get to work. And I should probably be out of town before they realize I'm gone, just in case they start to get into the details of those credentials."

"So I guess this is goodbye, then." There was resignation in her voice that he suspected hid sadness. For a moment, he didn't trust himself to speak. She was a witch who had kidnapped him! So what if she was kind of hot? But even as he thought it, he knew it was more than that. She was beautiful, yes, but she was more than that. He shouldn't have held her like he did. That was rule number one, no getting attached. But Hermione was a _good witch_. She'd already broken all the rules.

"Guess it is", he finally choked out. Seemingly making a split second decision, she used her wand to summon a piece of paper and a large feather quill. She scribbled something out and pressed it into his hand.

"Witches don't have phones", she said, "We can't use them. Magic makes them explode. But this is... an address I use for letters. So my parents can reach me. If you ever need me, send me a letter. I'll come."

Dean didn't know what to say. Luckily, he didn't need to. Slowly, gently, softly, Hermione reached up- she had to stand on her tiptoes- and kissed him on the cheek. He wrapped his arms around her and for a moment they simply stood there, holding each other. Finally, he kissed her rather hard on the forehead before releasing her and walking out the door without another word. About halfway down her driveway, he tried to turn and look back, see her house from the outside, take just a moment to collect himself. But when he turned his head, he found the driveway he'd been walking on and the house it connected to had vanished. As if they'd never been there at all.

**Author's Note:**

> I wrote this when I was fourteen, and you can certainly tell. I found it in my notes while going through my old computer and decided to post it as is, just for kicks. I only ever watched about half a season of Supernatural and honestly based most of this off of other Dean/Hermione fics I'd read, if my memory serves me well, so do forgive me for any factual errors, lol. There is also the makings of a sequel tucked away in my notes, and I've decided to post at least as much as I had written and possibly finish it if there's interest. It can be found on my page under the title "The Hunter and the Witch".
> 
> God, I feel like I'm in eighth grade again, this is a such strange place for me right now.


End file.
